Federal Deposit
Insurance Corporation

Executive Secretary, Attention: Comments/OES
Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
 550 17th Street, N.W.
Washington, DC 20429

RE: Docket No. R-1127

Gentlemen,

I am writing toyou in regards to the Patriot Act Regulations on Customer Identification. On the first page  and last paragraph of your press release number 85-2002, dated July 17, 2002, you state, "This identifying  information is essentially the same information currently obtained by most financial institutions." My question then is why should you put in to law what we as a industry are doing anyway? I will answer that by saying you shouldn't. We are already over burdened as an industry with regulations that don't make sense, which even your own field examiners will admit to. This law would not prevent crooks from being crooks. It will only be another burden to the staffs of financial institutions across the country. We need to be focused on safety and soundness and helping catch the bad guys. Program like this are well intended, but the daily paper work of trying to comply with bureaucratic laws, such as this, really prevent us from doing a good job, rather than help us to do a good job. While laws like this may sound or look good to the general public and to political leaders, the ultimate waste of time and money caused to financial institutions will be passed on to the consumer and will do little to deter crime. Please reconsider this proposal and realize what a cost it is to consumers with no real benefits to anyone.

Sincerely,